


You and Me against the World

by greygerbil



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-30
Updated: 2018-05-30
Packaged: 2019-05-15 23:42:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14800182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: Gladio always wanted to protect his sister, but life has not been kind on those plans. A look at their relationship through the years.





	You and Me against the World

**Author's Note:**

> For Gladio Fluff Week, Day 3: Perfect Big Brother Gladdy

Gladio waited until Jared’s footsteps faded away, accompanied by the silent creaking of the stairs, before he scurried down the hall to the door of the room that now belonged to his little sister. His fingers wrapped around the handle, pressing down slowly so he wouldn’t make a noise. When he pushed the door open, the first thing he saw was the big Moogle doll sitting in a corner. His mother had bought it just last week. Thinking about her laughing as she pointed the stuffed animal out to him, and that he’d never ever hear her voice again, made tears well up in his eyes, but Gladio breathed in deeply and swallowed them. His father hadn’t cried, either, when he came home to tell Gladio that his mother hadn’t made it through the birth. His mother wouldn’t have wanted him to be weak, so Gladio sniffed and pressed the palms of his hands against his eyes to make sure no tears escaped before he slid through the gap in the doorway into his sister’s room.

His father had told him not to come in here because he might wake her up, so Gladio took care to walk up to her bed as quietly as he could. Her peered through the wooden bars at the tiny baby sleeping soundly under a blanket. Her loose fist made Gladio’s hand look huge as he put it next to hers. He wanted to pet her, but didn’t, for fear of startling her after all.

He’d seen her before, of course, but this was the first time he was alone with his sister – with Iris, which was the name his mother had chosen for her. Iris was also a sort of flower, much like his own name, which he liked because that somehow felt like they belonged together, like siblings should. Jared had shown the deep purple blossoms of the iris to him in the garden. They were really pretty.

Gladio leaned his forehead against the bars. Since she was so tiny and didn’t even have a mother anymore, he would definitely need to become strong so he could always protect her.

-

“Iggy, can you help me?”

The two of them were in the park that laid in the shadow of the Citadel, which was a nice spot to hang around when they were on lunch break from their duties. Gladio fell down on the bench next to his friend, who closed the astronomy book he was reading. Gladio wondered briefly if it was Noctis or Ignis who did stars in class right now, since Ignis always followed the young prince’s curriculum, too, so that he would be able to tutor him.

“What is it?” Ignis asked.

“I need to learn how to sew.”

Ignis raised a brow at him.

“What do you need to sew?”

“My sister’s dress.”

Ignis flipped his thumb through the pages of the book.

“Why not give it to Jared?”

“He said he won’t fix it anymore, since it already looks pretty bad. I mean, he’s right, it’s not like she could really wear it in public anymore, you know? It’s her favourite, though.”

His sister was only three years old and as wild as Gladio had been told he had been at her age, so of course the thing she liked to wear most had a hundred tears and stains. It really didn’t look great anymore, but she loved it and Gladio wanted to help.

“Alright. But if the fabric is already scuffed and washed-out, then you probably can’t really sew it to look pretty.”

“That’s okay, it just needs to stay on her,” Gladio said with a laugh. “I know she’ll be happy to have it back.”

And, despite the fact that he was sure he was going to prick his fingers a lot trying to follow Ignis’ instructions, that was all that mattered.

-

“Are you wearing nail polish?”

“If you concentrated less on my nails and more on my sword, maybe I wouldn’t put you on your ass all the time,” Gladio grumbled. He resisted the urge to curl his fingers inwards against his palm as Noctis stared at them while he clambered back to his feet.

“Why’d you put that on?”

“Iris did.”

Grabbing his sword from the ground again, Noctis snorted.

“You should probably wash it off before you report to the Crownsguard later.”

Gladio glanced down at the green nail polish with the slightly wobbly dots of red paint that approximated flower petals. It was a really good effort for an eight-year-old, actually, which was why he hadn’t had the heart to remove it this morning. Hopefully she’d find someone else to practice on soon, but for now, he’d keep it.

“Nah, she worked hard on it. If someone has a problem with it, I’ll just punch them in the face. They’ll learn nail polish doesn’t make my fist less useful.”

-

“Now, where would you hit me if I stood like this and tried to pull you away?”

Iris considered Gladio leaning down over here, his hand circling her thin wrist. She was ten now, but she showed no signs of growing to the size other Amicitias had reached, which meant that Gladio had to adjust the self-defence moves he himself had once learned for her purposes – starting with the problem that she couldn’t solve half her potential conflicts by just looking imposing.

“If you bend over like that, I could get you in the eyes,” Iris said. “Or maybe the nose?”

“Or the throat. But you’d have to throw a decent punch for that, poking the eyes is easier. If you punch, keep your…”

“… thumb outside or you’ll break it, I know.” Iris rolled her eyes. “You’ve told me a hundred times.”

“Well, _do it_ , then.”

Gladio wrapped his other arm around her in a lightning-quick motion and lifted her off her feet, tickling her sides. Iris screeched with laughter and kicked her legs.

“I will, I will!” she promised breathlessly, after Gladio had thrown her on the couch like a pillow.

“And don’t forget your phone when you’re wandering around the city like you do. You can always call me.”

“I don’t get into fights, anyway,” Iris said with a shrug. “But okay. I know you’re going to be afraid if I don’t take it… scaredy-cat.”

She squealed when Gladio’s tickling hands descended on her once more.

-

“You think this is okay?”

Nervously, Iris twirled before the living room mirror in her red dress and adjusted the bow on the belt.

“Way too short, can’t let you go out like that,” Gladio said with a grin. “Guess you’ll have to dress in your winter coat.”

“Come on, be serious!” Iris answered, looking like she might stomp her foot.

Gladio waved his hand.

“It looks good. Don’t worry about it so much, he’ll like it. It’s not like most sixteen-year-old guys know much about fashion, anyway.”

“I guess you’re right…”

As Iris fumbled with her hair, Gladio found himself looking at her reflection in the mirror. It was kind of odd to think she was fifteen right now. Somehow, she seemed too young for this, but then, considering the things Gladio had gotten up to at that age, a first date was nothing.

He hoped she’d have fun despite the teenaged awkwardness that certainly laid in her path this afternoon. These days, with the Empire drawing closer and closer to the borders of the city, it felt like a shadow was over everything. Who knew how much more time she had when impressing some high school boy was the worst of her worries?

Maybe he was just having a bad day, though. They’d lived under the empire’s growing threat for a long while, there was no reason to believe it would all collapse now more than there had been three years ago. Gladio gave Iris a smile and a thumbs-up as she hurried to the entrance at the sound of the doorbell, positively vibrating with nervous excitement.

-

When Gladio closed the hotel room door behind Iris and him, neither of them spoke. There really wasn’t anything to say, he guessed. That they’d been worried about each other? They both knew that. What it was like, being lost as strangers in what basically felt like a foreign country? They were both too much Amicitia to admit to that it bothered them. That their father was dead? What was there to say?

Gladio sat down and his sister beside him. He glanced at the line of her slender neck, her hunched shoulders, her dark hair falling over her eyes. She looked older than he remembered. Maybe it was just that they weren’t at home anymore and never would be again because their family mansion was a smoking crater of rubble now, as Jared had informed him.

He put his arm around her and pulled her against his side. If it could have stayed like this, with the two of them here, maybe things would have been okay. That wouldn’t happen, though. He was going to follow the prince because he was the Shield and that meant the right thing for him to do was to leave his little sister behind in a city she’d never been to in the care of a child and a loyal but old and fragile man, who really, considering how long their family had worked for the Amicitias, didn’t deserve to be abandoned, either.

“Sorry I wasn’t there, kiddo,” he said, eventually. “And… I’m sorry I can’t stay around, either.”

“You have your job to do,” Iris answered. “Noctis needs you. It’s fine. I’m your sister. You think the Niffs could take me so easily?”

“’course not,” Gladio murmured.

Somehow, all he could think about was that when he had learned that his father had not made it out of the Citadel alive, along with the pain had come a vague sense of loss. It had nothing to do with his death and everything with the fact that he couldn’t even imagine what his father had thought or felt that moment when it all come to a close because Clarus Amicitia had been a great and dutiful Shield, always by Regis’ side, and as a result, Gladio had hardly known him. As he glanced out the window down the road he’d soon walk back to the car with Noctis and his companions, he wondered what Iris would feel if she got the news of his own death.

-

“This is the one-handed kind of sword Noctis liked to use. I think it would fit you pretty well.”

Gladio gave the weapon to his sister. It was dark outside. The hut was illuminated by a fire in the hearth. It was always dark now. He had long lost the sense for whether it should technically be night or day.

Iris cut the air with the weapon. There was intent in her movement. Gladio used to show her the ropes of some basic self-defence tactics back in the day, but you couldn’t put that sort of fire into someone with just that. The world turning into a demon-infested pit might do it, though. That, and her Amicitia blood. They were born to die fighting.

“This might work,” she agreed. “I should have something long-range, too.”

“I’ll ask Prompto to show you some pistols later.”

Gladio picked up a second sword of the same make to demonstrate with. He’d sworn to himself once that he would protect Iris, but the world had grown too dangerous for him to make good on that promise. It was a failure he couldn’t afford not to look square in the eye, though. If he couldn’t keep her out of the war, then there was only one way left for him to shield her, and that was to give her all the tools to survive on her own.

And yet, he wanted so much to simply stand between her and danger forever. It wasn’t going to work like that, though. It hadn’t worked for Noctis, either. Gladio wasn’t strong enough.

“Gladio? Is everything alright?”

Gladio blinked. There were tears in his eyes. He couldn’t remember crying since he’d been a child. It wouldn’t be good to make his sister worry like that.

“Yeah,” he said and forced himself to smile. “Come on, let’s get started.”


End file.
